


baby steps

by palehre



Category: Camp Camp (Web Series)
Genre: M/M, basically everyone is mentioned except for neil and harrison, chat bots, harrison is flustered easily, idk how to tag, in a neilish way so awkward, neil is ????? smooth ???????, rating is for language, takes place after Anti-Social Network, title is based off of Yotam Perel(Harrison's VA)'s song
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-28
Updated: 2018-05-28
Packaged: 2019-05-14 23:16:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14779158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/palehre/pseuds/palehre
Summary: He thought that maybe to get better at socializing, he should play to his potential friend's personalities, but he didn't know them very well.Hence, the graphing calculators.





	baby steps

Neil sucked at socializing.

Not only that, he despised it too. He hated the anxious feeling it gave him. It always made him sweat, and more often than not it made him twitch, which often caused others to think he was slowly going insane, which caused them to avoid him, which- you get the point; he hated socializing.

"Just fucking practice, you dumbass." Max wasn't much help, but he had asked him anyway.

"Just start rambling out of nowhere! That way the person is forced to talk to you, and you automatically get your way! Take home the social medal!" Nikki's advice made little to no sense, but he got the message bright and clear; just start talking. However, Neil sucked at that too. Without knowing what to talk about, he would honestly just be awkward and quiet. It wasn't like he could just randomly start talking about chemistry experiments; that would just bore anyone(Except for maybe Space Kid, that stupid wannabe jock of the scientific community). That's why whenever he was forced to converse with anyone, he would let them talk for the both of them and pretend to understand whatever the fuck they were talking about, even if he obviously didn't. He didn't know how to talk about other people's interests, unless he was insulting said interests. He sometimes wished that Nikki's Neil Bot had agreed to teach him how to socialize and didn't kill itself, since his friends(and Gwen too. He tried Gwen, yes.) were useless when it came to advice.

He remembered how his stupid chat bot had adapted itself to fit to everyone's personalities. He thought that maybe to get better at socializing, he should play to his potential friend's personalities, but he didn't know them very well.

Hence, the graphing calculators.

Originally, he had thrown them into the safe hidden underneath his workbench. He never decoded all of his work, because _holy_   _shit,_ he created artificial-intelligence with  _graphing calculators_. He opened up that safe and took a deep breath before reaching in and grabbing the first graphing calculator. He flipped it over, and read the name-tag(before he had shoved all of the calculators into the safe, he labeled all of them with each camper's name, just in case); it was Max's. He threw that one to the side right away, Max broke it right away when he had first handed it to him. He reached in again, and this time pulled out Nikki's, also throwing that one to the side since her's had killed itself. Those two didn't matter anyway, he was already good friends with Max and Nikki.

He sighed, grabbing each calculator one by one and analyzing the things the chat bots would say. Everybody's was different, because everyone had a different colorful personality at this god forsaken camp.

Nurf's was constantly talking about behavior and ultimate morals, and a little bit of politics. Ered's was about sports, and makeup trends. Dolph constantly gave drawing tips, and Space Kid's talked about all the stars and constellations. Nerris talked about stupid mystical creatures and talked as if it was in Game of Thrones. He had already listened to David's before, and it was pretty lame. All that bot talked about was trail mix. Preston's was the one that talked about "shipping people's baes", apparently. Unfortunately for Neil, all of these traits were pretty basic. Which meant he would actually need to talk to the other campers to find out more. _Fuck_.

He started to scoop up all the calculators, intending to throw them back into the safe when he realized he forgot one. He raised an eyebrow, immediately realizing he missed one specific camper.  _That one must be Harrison's._

He picked up the piece of shitty plastic, and ran his fingers over the buttons. Immediately the screen lit up and greeted him in it's very robotic voice. "Hello, Harrison!"

He sighed softly. "Hi, Neil." It still felt weird talking to "himself".

"What would you like to talk about, Harrison?"

"Whatever." He rolled his eyes.

The Neil Bot paused slightly for a moment, allowing Neil to sigh frustratedly. He was already bored, and moved to throw the calculator with the others.  _Oh well. It's not like I would ever want to be friends with Harrison anyway. He's not interesting in the slightest, and he's an asshole. Besides, we hate eachoth-_

"How about we talk about how cute you are, Harrison?"

He choked on air.  _Nevermind._

"W-What?"

"I love it very much when you smile, Harrison." The bot continued, spurting out flirtatious comments in a monotone voice. "I like you very much."

Neil felt his heart rate increase. "What the fuck?"

The bot paused. "Do you wish for me to stop? I thought you liked it when I praised you." Neil froze in place.  _Shit. That's right, this is supposed to be adapted to appease Harrison. So, wait, what?_

Neil let out a shaky breath that he didn't know he was holding. His face felt hot, and he knew right away he was blushing. He dropped the calculator, and slapped his cheeks once, twice, three times. He slumped against his bench, squeezing his eyes shut. He ran his hands over his face, and let out another breath. His eyes snapped open, and immediately were drawn to the graphing calculator laid beside him. _What the actual fuck?_

He sucked in some air through his teeth, then grasped the shitty plastic machine. "Hey, um, Neil?"

"Yes, Harrison?"

"How do you- how do I say this- feel about me?" He cringed inwardly at himself. He was literally asking a bot version of himself if he liked Harrison.  _Christ._

"I love you, of course. And you love me too, I'm assuming, considering you have told me that before."

Neil made a noise that sounded like a mix between a choke and a gasp. "He- I mean, I did?"

"Well, of course."

He felt his cheeks heat up more.  _Okay, okay, relax Neil. I bet it's nothing! Harrison probably just wanted to feel loved so he invested in a bot!_

He visibly relaxed. 

 _Harrison was convinced he was talking to_ me _, not the bot._

His eyes widened dramatically, and he fell over, curling into himself. 

_Harrison likes me. Shit, shit, shit._

 

* * *

 

 

He was going to confront Harrison about it today, after constantly avoiding the boy for maybe two weeks.

He didn't want to, but Max had started complaining about witnessing Harrison send Neil longing looks all the time, and vise versa. Neil had sputtered and swore at him for his comments, obviously embarrassed about anything relating to the fact that  _Harrison_ , of all people, liked _him._

(Or at least he hoped he did. He was still in denial if he's being honest with himself.)

He had it planned perfectly in his head. It was fast; it was easy. All he had to do was corner Harrison, pull out the calculator, ask "What the fuck is up with this?", and hopefully get a response. Nothing could possibly go wrong, right? Obviously not, because he didn't even get to step one.

He had only just stepped out of his tent, when his wrist was suddenly grabbed and he felt himself being dragged across the camp ground, then pushed into another tent, which was immediately zipped up afterwords. He looked up and realized his abductor was none other than the magician himself, the person he was literally just about to go look for.

"Care to explain why you decided to kidnap me?"

"Why the fuck have you been avoiding me?" Harrison, getting straight to the point, looked at him then, obviously pissed off, even though his calm tone spoke otherwise. Neil felt his face flush in embarrassment. He opened his mouth to speak when Harrison interrupted. "And don't say some bullshit excuse like 'I didn't know I was avoiding you!' because we both know that's a fucking lie."

Neil froze on the spot, an anxious feeling crawling all over his skin. He knew that when Harrison swore as much as he was right now, he meant _business_. He was _not_ fucking around right now. Even so, Neil needed to remain in control. He felt that he should be the one doing the questioning right now, not the Israeli boy standing in front of him.

"Why do you care?" He pushed all of his nervous feelings down, concealing them, "Do you actually care if I'm there to insult your shitty tricks, Harrison?" He didn't know why, but he raised an eyebrow and smirked, teasing the slightly shorter boy. It seemed to have the desired effect, because Harrison stepped back slightly and his face turned bright red. His lips curled up more. "Well?"

"Um," He paused, "I-I just was curious..?" He managed to choke out a response, but it sounded too much like a question to be convincing. Neil made a "tch" noise, shaking his head slightly.

"That's not gonna cut it, but whatever." Neil sighed slightly, a sign that he was giving up. "I have something else I need to talk to you about anyways, and it ties in with the whole avoiding deal." He quickly changed the subject, forcing himself to sound professional and hiding the fact that he was probably going to have a panic attack from the anxious feeling in his skin, not to mention the fact that he was still embarrassed, and also the fact that he was slowly finding Harrison to be more attractive every few seconds.

He saw the other boy's embarrassed expression morph into a confused one, and oh  _god,_ it wasn't fair that his confused face was so adorable. Neil's cheeks flared.

He reached into his back pocket silently, and pulled out the graphing calculator. "Do you remember what this shitty thing is?" Neil watched Harrison's face silently, waiting for some sort of reaction.

 _Holy shit,_ did he get one.

Harrison let out a squeaking noise, face immediately flushing even more red. His gloved hands flew up to his face, a futile attempt to hide his embarrassment. He then whined quietly. "P-Please don't tell me that one is mine and it's still operational.."

"It's yours and it's still operational. It's very much adapted to appease you." 

Harrison whined loudly this time. "Oh god, no, please no." He started pulling down his obnoxiously small top-hat down to his face in order to conceal more of it. Neil, eyebrow arching once again, blinked. The other boy seemed to realize exactly what he had meant.

"So, you understand, yes?" He paused, and Harrison nodded reluctantly, peaking out from behind his hat. "Did you really tell the bot that you liked me?" He pressed, reaching up, and pushing that stupid top hat away from the shorter's face. The illusionist nodded once again.

"W-Well, y'know, I thought that I was talking to y-you.." Harrison trailed off and bit his lip. It was a nervous habit, and Neil knew this. He had seen the other do it before; quite a bit actually. "And when the bot said, _you know_ , I-I was _really_ happy and, j-just, _fuck_."

"Just fuck?" 

"Just, god damn it, it hurt when I found out it was a fucking chat bot, okay?" He huffed, "It's not like you could ever like me back anyway, so I don't know what I was fucking thinking. I know you hate me. That's why you were avoiding me then, right? Because I like you, and you don't like me?" His voice cracked, eyes squinting shut and waiting for an answer.

Neil panicked on the inside.  _Fuck, don't cry-_

"Hey," His hand was suddenly cupping Harrison's chin, and Harrison's eyes snapped open.  _What the fuck am I doing?_

Before he could even comprehend _what the fuck_ he was doing, he had pressed his lips against Harrison's.

The kiss was awkward; neither of them knew what they were doing, but Harrison had grasped onto his shoulders, clinging onto his sleeves for dear life, and it felt fucking _amazing_ to Neil. His hands felt warm even through those stupid magician gloves. His own hand moved from cupping the other's chin to cupping his cheek, and the other hand moved to Harrison's waist. He had stepped closer too.

The position was awkward, and the kiss was awkward, and they were both definitely awkward after it had ended. Harrison's face was flushed, and he seemed too embarrassed to even face Neil, because he had tucked his head into the Jewish boy's neck and whined. (Apparently Harrison was very prone to whining when embarrassed, but it wasn't like Neil was complaining. He thought it was honestly _really_ cute.) Neil proceeded to wrap both his arms around the Israeli boy's waist. It was a quiet moment, and both boys were savoring it.

However, one problem that comes with being bad at social interaction is that you don't really know when to talk and when not to, and Neil fell victim to this quite often. 

"H-How about we talk about how cute you are, Harrison?"

Harrison snorted, and Neil cringed inwardly at his awkwardness.

"I can't believe you just ruined the moment with some shitty line that the chat bot would say all the time."

 

**Author's Note:**

> wow this was shit  
> if it seems rushed im sorry :')


End file.
